Ben Teune's analytics, a VAR paper, the 100th episode, and why nobody plays in perfect conditions.
July was a full month - four podcasts, a milestone 100th episode that ran long enough to need splitting in two, and a catch-up that ended up threading all of it together.
This is the first issue in a new format: one newsletter a month, covering everything, instead of a separate email for every episode. If you want the full-length version of anything below, every link takes you there - this is just the flavour.
Week 1 - Ben Tune: Problem-Driven Data
A sports scientist and analytics lead at the WTA, four years embedded with the Western Bulldogs (AFL) for his PhD under Sam Robertson. His argument: "problem-driven data, not data-driven solutions" - start with the coaching question, then find the data, not the other way round.
"We should have problem-driven data. The data should be there to solve the problem that already exists." - Ben Teune
https://www.buzzsprout.com/2354827/episodes/19411642
Listen to the full episode
https:vuir.vu.edu.au/44767/1/TEUNE_Ben-Thesis_nosignature.pdf
Ben's full PhD Thesis
https://vuir.vu.edu.au/44391/3/Teune%20et%20al.%202022.pdf
His key journal paper (constraint interaction in AFL training, 2022)
Week 2 — The VAR Paper: What Slow Motion Hides
Ian and Keith reviewed Schutz, Betsch and Plessner's research on slow-motion replay and intention attribution, joined by referee-researcher Scott Russell - the first-ever guest on a theory episode. The finding: slowing footage down doesn't show you what happened, it shows a rendering, and that rendering makes contact look more deliberate than it was.
Why it matters: direct implications for VAR - the technology built to remove doubt may be introducing a bias of its own.
Week 3 — Episode 100: Chris Button
Our 100th episode - and it ran long enough that Part Two is now a separate August release. Professor Chris Button (University of Otago) traced the PhD finding he still sees coaches average away: his own ball-catching data looked like "no effect" on paper, until he stopped pooling participants and looked at individuals.
https://www.buzzsprout.com/2354827
Listen to Episode 100
Week 4 — Nobody Plays in Perfect Conditions
Pulled straight from this month's catch-up (see below) - wet balls, compressed schedules, one-session design, and the England Under-21s story about staying in the green.
Clip of the Month: The ANOVA That Showed Nothing
"I really delved into that data because... the ANOVA was showing nothing. I was confused because I'd seen that there were differences between them as I was collecting the data." - Chris Button
The fix wasn't better instrumentation - it was refusing to average.
Members-Only This Month
- Monthly catch-up (30 July): an hour with Ian and Keith covering the NBA's brutal fixture list, single-session design, the constraints continuum, and the story behind "stay in the green."
- Hosts' presentation: a deeper cut on the video-speed/intention-attribution paper than the public episode covered, going further into the VAR implications.
- Paper review: the written discussion guide and study summary for the same paper - for anyone who'd rather read than watch.
- Member session: a separate presentation on "constrain to afford vs. constrain to potentiate," the distinction Ian and Keith have been refining across several conversations this year.
- Early-release guest podcast: members heard Ben Teune's episode a week before it went public.
What We're Reading
https://pess.rdc.nie.edu.sg/nienlp/
Jai Chow's Non-Linear Pedagogy Hub - a new, growing collection of articles, videos, lesson plans and an observational tool, flagged by Ian on this month's catch-up.
Next month: Part Two of the Chris Button conversation lands the first week of August, alongside the usual four-week cycle. See you next month.
Ian, Keith & Martyn
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